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Rebellion

Ezekiel 20-21

Well brothers, there are a couple of things on which I would like to comment.  I remember a day many years ago when I was going door to door to share the Gospel.  At one particular house a man answered the door and was willing to speak with me for a few moments.  As I shared with him his need for a savior he told me he was a Catholic but that he viewed Jesus as just a really good guy who set a really good example but that He was not God.  He offered as proof of this statement the fact that Jesus referred to Himself as “The Son of Man”.

Have you ever wondered about that?  We have been hearing here in Ezekiel God refer to Ezekiel as the son of man.  Is there a connection?  Well let me share with you some thoughts from a couple of commentaries.

“Jesus used the term “Son of Man” as His favored description for Himself. It has been suggested that the title “Son of God” is Jesus’ divine name (Matt. 8:29); “Son of David,” His Jewish name (Matt. 9:27); and “Son of Man,” the name that ties Jesus to His earthly mission. The term itself is based on Daniel 7:13–14, where it served as a reference to God.”

Dockery, D. S. (1998). Holman concise Bible commentary: Simple, straightforward commentary on every book of the Bible. Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

“IN FOCUS – “son of man”

(Heb. ben ?adam) (2:1; 3:1; 17:2; 24:16) Strong’s #1121; 120: The expression son of man is used nearly one hundred times as a title for Ezekiel (2:1). It serves both to emphasize the difference between God the Creator and His creatures, and to mark the prophet Ezekiel as a representative member of the human race. Ezekiel’s life was a living parable or object lesson to the Hebrew captives in Babylon (compare 1:3; 3:4–7). In word and deed, Ezekiel was a “sign” to the house of Israel (12:6). Jesus adopted the title Son of Man because He too is a representative person—the “last Adam” who became a life-giving spirit (Matt. 8:20; 1 Cor. 15:45). The title of Son of Man for Jesus also alludes to Daniel’s vision of the heavenly being who is “like the Son of Man” (Dan. 7:13). Thus the title Son of Man for Jesus highlights the mystery of the Incarnation, the fact that Christ is both divine and human. As the God-man, Jesus became a glorious sign for all of sinful humanity (Luke 2:34)…”

…Son of man: Ezekiel uses this phrase more than ninety times to refer to himself. It emphasizes his humanity in his God-given role as a spokesman for God. The meaning of the phrase is “human one.” In the OT, only Dan. 7:13 and  8:17 also employ this phrase. In the NT, Son of Man is used frequently by Jesus for Himself. With this phrase Jesus was calling Himself “the Human One,” the long-awaited Messiah who came as God in the flesh (Luke 21:27; John 1:14; 2 John 7). Thus the expression Son of Man is not a contradiction of Jesus’ divinity, as is sometimes alleged.”

Radmacher, E. D., Allen, R. B., & House, H. W. (1999). Nelson’s new illustrated Bible commentary. Nashville: T. Nelson Publishers.

Finally this verse stood out to me as a challenge to all men today.

Ezekiel 20:8

“But they rebelled against me and were not willing to listen to me. None of them cast away the detestable things their eyes feasted on, nor did they forsake the idols of Egypt.”

Have you cast away the detestable things that your eyes have feasted upon?  You know what I’m talking about.  Our society today idolizes sex, and it is difficult for a man to turn his gaze in any direction without his lustful nature being assaulted by some vision that pulls his heart away from God.  That is not, however, an excuse to continue in this sin.  The issue isn’t what the world around you is doing.  The issue is your decision to submit to your Heavenly Father and obey Him.  Once you have truly decided to obey Him you will find the strength to resist the world.  If you continue to stumble here it is because you are rebelling against God and are not willing to listen to Him.  You don’t want to give it up.

This is hard to hear, I know.  It is hard for me to say it for I am a man like you and my senses come under attack just like yours.  I have stumbled and it hurts; it burns.  It hurts because that is not who God created me to be.  It is not who He created you to be.  He created us to worship and glorify Him.  It is our willfulness, our desire to be our own god that keeps us from obeying and submitting completely to Christ.  The world and its idol sex have only the power over us that we give it.  It is a choice and we must learn to choose differently.  Allowing our eyes to feast upon this idol is a willful rebellion against your Creator and Savior.  It cannot continue.  It must stop now.  In His strength you can cast that detestable thing aside.

Have a rebellion free day!

Your brother and servant in Christ,

Bill

Dying to self, living to serve!

Turn And Live

Ezekiel 17-19

Have you ever spoken to someone who said “I can’t believe in a god who would allow all this suffering in the world”?  Did you know that such a statement is actually idolatry?  They are choosing to believe in something other than God.  They have created their own god because they won’t believe in a god who does not function as they see fit.  What foolishness.  God is God whether you like it or not.  You can say you won’t believe in Him but that doesn’t take away His existence or authority.

This is God’s world and He can do with it as He sees fit.  Listen to this from today’s reading:

Ezekiel 18:4

“Behold, all souls are mine; the soul of the father as well as the soul of the son is mine: the soul who sins shall die.”

All souls are God’s and He has decreed that all who sin shall die.  Who has sinned?

Romans 3:23

“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”

His world, His rules; you are a dead man.  Still, God does not wish that any will perish.

Ezekiel 18:25-32

“Yet you say, ‘The way of the Lord is not just.’ Hear now, O house of Israel: Is my way not just? Is it not your ways that are not just?  When a righteous person turns away from his righteousness and does injustice, he shall die for it; for the injustice that he has done he shall die.  Again, when a wicked person turns away from the wickedness he has committed and does what is just and right, he shall save his life.  Because he considered and turned away from all the transgressions that he had committed, he shall surely live; he shall not die.  Yet the house of Israel says, ‘The way of the Lord is not just.’ O house of Israel, are my ways not just? Is it not your ways that are not just?  “Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, every one according to his ways, declares the Lord God. Repent and turn from all your transgressions, lest iniquity be your ruin.  Cast away from you all the transgressions that you have committed, and make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit! Why will you die, O house of Israel?  For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Lord God; so turn, and live.”

Let there be no confusion.  All who die will deserve their death.  Yet, it is not God’s desire that any should perish.  He has provided a way to be saved.  It isn’t cheap, and it isn’t easy, but it is simple.  “Turn and live”.  Jesus died on the cross that we may live.  We must accept His atoning sacrifice to be saved but we can only truly accept it after we have decided to turn from our sinful ways.  He will help us destroy sins hold on us be we must decide to do so first.

I worry that far too many people have walked the aisles of churches proclaiming they have accepted the salvation that only Jesus can provide but have not truly decided to turn from their sin.  Oh, I’m sure they feel badly about their past behavior, and that is part of it, but feeling bad does not mean that you have firmly committed yourself to turning your back on your sinful ways.  Feeling bad and saying the magic words does not save you.

A changed heart that accepts His sacrifice and is humbly and thankfully submitted to Christ saves you.  That change is the commitment to turn.  God wants you to live but you must decide to do so.  Jesus isn’t a cheap insurance policy; He is a changed life dedicated to the glory of God.  If you haven’t already, will you turn and live?

Have a God glorifying day!

Your brother and servant in Christ,

Bill

Dying to self, living to serve!

Different

Ezekiel 14-16

Do you know what I thought when I finished reading today’s passages?  I thought “Boy is God mad!  He is really, really mad!”  Now we have been reading of God’s condemnation of Judah for a while but in today’s verses He used some pretty strong examples to get the point across.  The first verses that really stopped me in my tracks was this:

Ezekiel 14:13-14

“Son of man, when a land sins against me by acting faithlessly, and I stretch out my hand against it and break its supply of bread and send famine upon it, and cut off from it man and beast, even if these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they would deliver but their own lives by their righteousness, declares the Lord God.”

The reason these verses got my attention is that Ezekiel and Daniel were contemporaries.  Ezekiel was using Noah and Job as examples of righteous men and I understood that.  These were examples from the earliest of recorded history.  People had millennia to read of them and learn to revere their righteousness.  Daniel could very well have been alive at the time of the writing of these verses.  This meant that his renown as a righteous man had spread fairly quickly.

God’s point in mentioning these men was to help the wayward people of Judah to understand that not only did they lack righteousness to save themselves from punishment, but that, even if these three righteous men themselves were among them, even their righteousness would not be enough to save them.  You see Noah’s righteousness saved his sons and their wives and even the future of all mankind.  Job’s righteousness had allowed him to survive his trials and saw children and wealth restored to him.  Daniel was the current “rock star” of righteousness.  His fame as a righteous man, and the protection God had afforded him, was obviously known far and wide.   Ezekiel was simply using the most widely recognized person of righteousness known to the people of the day as another example of righteousness that could not save the condemned.

The people of Judah considered themselves righteous and they were horribly mistaken.  God was trying to get that point across to them.  I recently spoke with an individual who was as lost as lost can be.  He was rather nasty in his attitude toward Christians.  He was one of the most arrogant men I have ever met.  He viewed himself as a purveyor of peace and justice and love – all while cussing up a blue streak at me for the crime of being stupid.  He has it all figured out you see.  The rest of us are just too stupid to understand his brilliant truth.  He is his own idol.  He has no intention of repenting and turning away from all his abominations.  He is dead meat.  It breaks my heart.

The reason God said that even if Noah, Daniel, and Job were among them they would only deliver themselves, is because these lost folks would not listen to even these righteous men.  That man I spoke with?  I wonder if he would repent even if Jesus Christ himself appeared before him.  That is how hard his heart seemed to me.  That is how hard the heart of the people of Judah’s time had been.

Moving on, all of chapter 16 is a vivid example of how horribly Judah had behaved toward God.  God gave an analogy of infidelity as a way to communicate the severity of Judah’s transgressions.  I pictured a Hollywood movie as I read that chapter.  I’m sure I’ve seen some version of this on the silver screen.  The man that finds a down and out, helplessly wretched woman in a gutter and saves her, and pours his love and riches on her only to later discover her cheating on him and giving away his extravagant gifts to her many lovers who simply use her and cast her aside.  How would you feel if your wife did something similar to you?  Would you be angry?

Finally, this next verse made me wonder about the church in America.

Ezekiel 16:47

“Not only did you walk in their ways and do according to their abominations; within a very little time you were more corrupt than they in all your ways.”

Judah had become more corrupt than the nations that surrounded them.  What was God’s purpose in establishing Israel as His people; His nation?  He established them to show His power and grace to the rest of the world.  What did His chosen people choose to do?  They chose to cast Him aside and chase after foreign gods.  They became even more debauched than the rest of the nations around them.  In today’s reading God mentioned Sodom in comparison to Judah.

I remember hearing a quote attributed to Billy Graham “If God doesn’t punish America He will owe Sodom and Gomorrah an apology”.   America has certainly become a rather toxic culture.  Many in our country today think the Muslim world hates us because of our politics.  I’m sure our support of Israel doesn’t go down easy for some Muslims but many of their Imams seem to harp on our poisonous culture.  If you think sex and violence is a corrosive influence in society then you must think the American culture is pure acid.

So if our American culture is so foul, why do the statistics show little difference between Americans that call themselves Christians and those that don’t?  The divorce rate is almost identical.  We hear of sexual perversion and violence committed by alleged Christians almost every day.  I don’t believe we are there yet, but is there a day when the church in America is more corrupt than the non-believers?  I find it hard to believe that such a thing could ever occur, but why is that we so closely mirror the society around us?  Aren’t we supposed to be different?

Let me ask you; are you different than your lost neighbor?  How?  How does this difference make itself known?  Would your neighbor view you as different – in a good way?  Christians in America today are not the people of Judah back in the day; not even close.  The people of Judah had surpassed the evil of their neighbors; we have not done that, nor do I think we ever will, but our behavior is getting too close to that of our lost neighbors and boy is it time for us to start pushing the needle the other way.  It is time for us to stand up and show the difference.  Will you be different?  I hope so!

May your neighbor see the light of Christ in you!

Your brother and servant in Christ,

Bill

Dying to self, living to serve!

Heart Of Stone Or Flesh

Ezekiel 11-13

It just never ceases to amaze me how God, even in the midst of declaring punishment, will declare salvation.  God had allowed the descendants of Israel to become as debauched as they could be before He finally declared it was time for wrath.  Even so, He tells us once again in today’s reading that He will redeem a remnant.  He will call them back to Him, and restore them to the Promised Land, and He will be their God.

Listen to this:

Ezekiel 11:16-21

“Therefore say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: Though I removed them far off among the nations, and though I scattered them among the countries, yet I have been a sanctuary to them for a while in the countries where they have gone.’  Therefore say, ‘Thus says the Lord God: I will gather you from the peoples and assemble you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.’ And when they come there, they will remove from it all its detestable things and all its abominations.   And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God.  But as for those whose heart goes after their detestable things and their abominations, I will bring their deeds upon their own heads, declares the Lord God.”

It is crucial to notice that God is doing the work.  It is He who will call the lost back to Him.  It is He who will change their heart.  It is He who will make it possible for them to walk in His ways and obey.  We men want a step-by-step guide that will show us how we can make ourselves right with God.  It is just the way we guys think.  Unfortunately, this desire for a step-by-step guide over which we are in control is part of our problem.  We can’t make ourselves right with God.  We cannot take steps A, B, and C and be right with God.  We have to completely give ourselves over to Him.  We have to completely deny ourselves.  We have to accept that we serve Him and we have no rights.

I love the U.S. Declaration of Independence and I think the line that states that we are endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights is correct as far as our interaction with each other goes, but we must be careful not to fool ourselves into thinking that we have “rights” before God.  “Rights” are a human idea.  Rights are about limiting the power others have over you.  God has unlimited rights over you and if you accept Christ as your Lord and Savior then you are acknowledging this fact.  You have no rights.  It is when we wish to exercise our “right” to make our own decisions that we get into trouble.  It is when we surrender that right to Christ that we are actually set free.

It is the desire to be lord of ourselves that stands in the way of being the men God created us to be.  God’s ways seem like fantastic opposites to us.  How can one be strong through weakness?  How can the first be last and the last first?  How can one be free only when they truly surrender all their rights?  All of this is a great mystery to most of us but you need to understand that God is the only meaningful power and strength available.  If you want to be truly strong you must deny your own strength and lean on His.  If you want to be first in God’s book you need to view yourself as the least for it is the humble heart that is the heart of flesh.  The self-powered heart is the heart of stone.

God can change that heart and in many of you He is.  He will teach you how to be humble.  He will teach you how to rely on His strength rather than your own.  It will hurt, but you will learn.  I, like you, am a sinner saved by grace.  During my walk with Him, God has shown me from time to time sin in my life that must be removed.  I have discovered that when I puff out my chest and declare that I will sin no more I fail, but when I go to my knees with a broken heart and humbly ask God to forgive me and strengthen me I find that He gives me the humble attitude of heart I need to go and sin no more.  In my strength I am weak but in His I can conquer all.

If you have accepted Christ your heart of stone has been removed and a new heart of flesh, filled with His spirit, beats in its place.  If you haven’t accepted Christ, God will bring your deeds upon your own head.  You will have earned it and you have no rights or strength before Him.  We must choose ourselves or Him; a heart of stone or a heart of flesh.  Which will it be?

Have a day filled with the strength of God!

Your brother and servant in Christ,

Bill

Dying to self, living to serve!

Wrong Seal!

Are You Sealed?

Ezekiel 7-10

Ezekiel and Revelation share a number of images and prophecy.  In today’s reading what really stood out to me was this:

Ezekiel 9:4

“And the Lord said to him, “Pass through the city, through Jerusalem, and put a mark on the foreheads of the men who sigh and groan over all the abominations that are committed in it.”

Does that passage remind you of any other passage in the Bible?

Take a look at this:

I’ve always been fascinated by end time prophecy.  I remember reading the “Left Behind” series of novels which I thoroughly enjoyed.  Now guys, I’m not sure it is solid theology, but I enjoyed the fictional imagining of the last days.  (The view fictionalized in these novels is pretribulation, premillennial eschatology – if you just understood what I wrote there could you please explain it to me?)

I was particularly moved by the twelfth book of the series, “Glorious Appearing”,  in which Christ returns.  I don’t know that it was necessarily the skill of the authors that moved me as much as simply picturing my Savior’s return.  Can you imagine?  Every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess, that Jesus Christ is Lord!!!  I am still moved by the thought of it.

Those novels address the issue of the mark of the children of God.  Just as those that follow after the beast will have his mark, the followers of Christ will carry His.  Many have wondered what these marks might look like.  The Left Behind guys had the saints marked with a cross on their forehead that only other Christians could see.

I don’t know if you saw the movie “The Omen”.  It was first released in 1976 and stared Gregory Peck and Lee Remick.  That movie scared the tar out of me!  It was a story about the birth and initial rise of the anti-christ.  At any rate, the beastie boy had three sixes on the back of his head.  We discover this when someone pulls back the child’s hair while he is sleeping.  It didn’t go well for the hair puller after that by the way.

Creepy side bar here.  I remember reading the book “The Omen” back in the early 80’s.  The name of the anti-christ character was Damien Thorn.  Shortly thereafter I was watching the ending credits of a movie, the name of which is now long lost to memory.  Often these credits will include the name of the producing or distributing company.  The name of one of these companies was “Thorn Industries”; only mildly creepy.  Shortly after that, however, I was reading about the head of the European Common Market coming to Canada.

Now many of you may not have followed some of the end time theories out there but at one time it was thought that maybe the anti-christ would be the head of the European Common Market, otherwise known as the EU.  This idea came from the fact that at the time the EU had ten member countries and that Revelation stated the anti-christ would be head of a renewed Rome.  The Roman Empire at one time had 10 administrative divisions.  Get it; ten horns, ten countries?  Yep, it’s a stretch.  Anyway, I was reading in the paper that the head of the EU was to visit Canada.  Can you guess his name?  I promise you this is the truth.  The paper said his name was Damien Thorn!  If I’m lie’n,  I’m die’n!  Gives me the creeps just thinking about it!

Was that guy the anti-christ?  If he was he didn’t make much of a splash.  It is fun to try and figure out how the end times will play out but I think it is important to remember that it isn’t a game and that we won’t know the time until it is upon us.  As I read Ezekiel 9:4 it occurred to me that the mark was for those who sighed and groaned over abominations before God.  The mark was on their forehead.  Guys, is it just possible that the mark we are to receive on our foreheads is a right attitude toward God?

In my moments of being in right attitude toward God, others have come up to me and in various ways basically told me that they could see Jesus in me.  I can never hope for a greater compliment than that.  Is that the mark; the seal?  It certainly seems to be a prerequisite at the least.

Brothers, judgment is coming.  The elect will be drawn to those that reflect the light of Jesus Christ; the lost will be repelled by it.  Let the heart of Christ reign within you so that His light will shine before men and draw them to salvation.  You are indeed sealed with the mind of Christ!

Have a Christ-like day!

Your brother and servant in Christ,

Bill

Dying to self, living to serve!

Are you a Watchman?

Ezekiel 3-6

Perhaps it’s just me.  Perhaps I am the only one among us, reading through the Bible together, who is hearing God’s call to love the lost; to take His message to His people.  Pastor Jim Cross has been giving a series of sermons on the issue of “election”.  Election is a concept scattered throughout Scripture that states that God has “chosen” those that will be saved.  I’ve put that as coarsely as I could for a reason.

We have a hard time accepting a God who doesn’t intend to save everyone.  For some reason we think that is unfair.  Look at what Paul has to say about this issue:

Romans 9:14-24

“What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means!  For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”  So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy.  For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.”  So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills.

You will say to me then, “Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?”  But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, “Why have you made me like this?”  Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?  What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory— even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?”

Men, since the fall of Adam and Eve, the true desire of every human heart has been to be god.  This means that every one of us deserves destruction.  There is no one who deserves salvation; BUT God, in His mercy, has saved some of the undeserving for Himself.  He made each of us, and He knew before He created us which of us would respond to the light; which of us would be obedient; which of us would be His children.  Jesus is the light of the world and He came to call the children of light home.  The children of darkness will flee before His piercing light; the children of God will be drawn to the light.

Christ has ascended into heaven but having placed His light within the hearts of His followers He has sent them to pass that light to the rest of the elect.  You see, you can be a member of the elect and not know it.  You can be a member of the elect and be angry and hateful toward Christians.  I remind you of Paul himself who was personally responsible for the death of many saints.  You and I cannot know who is a member of the elect and who is not.  We have not been given the luxury of being told beforehand to whom we should take the Gospel; just that we must take it to a lost and dying world.  Whether those that hear the proclamation of the Gospel respond or not is God’s business; ours is to do shine the light.  Listen to this from our reading today:

Ezekiel 3:10-11

“Moreover, he said to me, “Son of man, all my words that I shall speak to you receive in your heart, and hear with your ears.  And go to the exiles, to your people, and speak to them and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God,’ whether they hear or refuse to hear.”

Brother, have you received the Word of God in your heart?  Will you not go to your people, the “elect”, to speak to them and say “Thus says the Lord God”?  Will you not go whether they hear or refuse to hear?  No?  It would be a mistake to refuse God.

Ezekiel 3:17-21

“Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel. Whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you shall give them warning from me.  If I say to the wicked, ‘You shall surely die,’ and you give him no warning, nor speak to warn the wicked from his wicked way, in order to save his life, that wicked person shall die for his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand.  But if you warn the wicked, and he does not turn from his wickedness, or from his wicked way, he shall die for his iniquity, but you will have delivered your soul.  Again, if a righteous person turns from his righteousness and commits injustice, and I lay a stumbling block before him, he shall die. Because you have not warned him, he shall die for his sin, and his righteous deeds that he has done shall not be remembered, but his blood I will require at your hand.  But if you warn the righteous person not to sin, and he does not sin, he shall surely live, because he took warning, and you will have delivered your soul.”

Here God is telling Ezekiel to be a watchman, to warn the lost and the back-slider.  He holds the sinner responsible for the sin but Ezekiel for the warning.  Now you may well say to me that God was speaking to a specific person, Ezekiel, about a specific people, Jews, in a specific time and place, about 537 B.C. in Babylon.  All of that is true, of course, but can you really sit there and tell me that this does not apply to you and me today?  If God felt that way about warning the lost and back-slider then, why would He feel differently today?  If you are His child He sent you to be a watchman as well.

Matthew 28:18-20

“And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.  Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

He is speaking to you.  Will you go?  Will you warn the lost?  You do not have to go far.  You are surrounded by the lost.  Will you be a watchman?  All you must do is shine the light of Jesus Christ.  Speak the truth of the Gospel and the elect will be drawn to it; the others will be repelled.  So be it.  He will have mercy on whom He will have mercy and compassion on whom He will have compassion.

May the Lord find you faithful!

Your brother and servant in Christ,

Bill

Dying to self, living to serve!